Pond Lehocky Stern Giordano was recognized for attorney diversity in The Legal Intelligencer for the third consecutive year. The article provides a summary of attorney demographics in Pennsylvania’s plaintiff bars based on a decade’s worth of annual survey statistics. One of the top three firms with the most diverse attorney pool, over 40% of Pond Lehocky’s 39 associates are women.
Although the article states that the overall percentage of female attorneys who are trial lawyers has increased from 23 percent a decade ago to 28 percent in 2017, the representation of female diversity in plaintiff lawyers is still remarkably low overall—and the numbers are increasing at a very slow rate.
Senior Associate Melissa Chandy, who recently participated at The Legal Intelligencer’s 2017 Diversity Roundtable, suggested that giving diverse attorneys opportunities to lead will help empower others.
“We’ve done a great job of retaining diverse attorneys,” said Melissa, who has been with the firm for 10 years. “And one thing that I found was a really good measure was putting diverse attorneys in leadership roles in the firm. So you’re not just hired and then kind of immersed in this culture. You’re seeing diverse attorneys who have input in decisions and who have input in strategy.”
Associate Kajal Alemo, who participated in The Legal Intelligencer’s 2016 Women in the Profession Roundtable discussion, talked about her own leadership experiences.
“One thing I work on all the time is figuring out how to lead my team differently,” she said. “I think that it’s just very important if you want to stand out, as a [man] or a woman, to be creative.”
To read the full article in The Legal Intelligencer, click here.
